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What Is Thai Peanut Sauce?
Thai peanut sauce is probably one of the most popular Asian dipping sauces. Everyone loves the taste of peanut sauce since it’s so tasty, versatile, and addictive.
Thai peanut sauce goes well with skewers of chicken sate or grilled meat, but it’s also amazing with other protein such as shrimp or fish.
Most people think that peanut sauce is hard to make and never attempted it at home. The best thing about this peanut sauce recipe is that it doesn’t involve much cooking, all you need is to mix the ingredients in a sauce pan, heat it up, and voila, you have the homemade peanut sauce.
This easy peanut sauce takes less than 15 minutes. Add all the ingredients in a sauce pan, heat it up, whisk it and it’s done.
Recipes That Go Well with Peanut Sauce:
Ingredients for Thai Peanut Sauce Recipe
You will only need a few key ingredients:
- Peanut Butter
- Coconut Milk
- Thai red curry paste
- Apple cider vinegar
- Salt
- Sugar
Frequently Asked Questions
Is Peanut Sauce Vegan?
Yes, the best part is that this sauce is vegan!
How Long Can You Keep Peanut Sauce?
The sauce will be good in the fridge for up to 1 week.
How Many Calories?
This recipe has 397 calories per serving.
What Dishes to Serve with This Recipe?
This meal is best served as a condiment with these recipes. For a wholesome Thai meal and easy weeknight dinner, I recommend the following.
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Thai Peanut Sauce
Ingredients
- 1/2 cup creamy peanut butter
- 3/4 cup coconut milk
- 2 tablespoons Thai red curry paste
- 2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
- 1 tablespoon sugar or to taste
- 2 tablespoons ground peanut
- salt to taste
Pan-Fried Turmeric Chicken
- 2 chicken thighs (skin-on, boneless)
- 1/2 teaspoon turmeric powder
- salt
- black pepper
Instructions
- Add all the ingredients in the saucepan. Use a whisk to quickly whisk all the ingredients together before transferring to a stove top to heat up on low heat. Continue to whisk the peanut sauce until all ingredients are well-combined.
- As soon as the peanut sauce starts to simmer and bubble, turn off the heat. (If you like the sauce more watery, you may add a little water to dilute it during the cooking process.) Transfer off the heat and top with some ground peanut.
- The Thai peanut sauce is now ready. You can keep the left over in the fridge for a week without losing the fresh taste. To make the chicken, marinate both sides of the chicken thighs with turmeric powder, salt and black pepper, for 15 minutes.
- Pan fry the chicken with some oil until both sides are nicely brown and slightly "crispy," and the meat is cooked through. Slice the chicken into pieces and drizzle with the peanut sauce and garnish with some chopped cilantro leaves. Serve immediately with rice and with fresh salad of your choice.
Video
Nutrition
Notice: Nutrition is auto-calculated, using Spoonacular, for your convenience. Where relevant, we recommend using your own nutrition calculations.
This is an awesome recipe! Made it twice already this week, I could just eat it on its own! I used chunky peanut butter as that was what was available. I prefer tamarind juice and brown sugar as ran out of palm sugar. Thanks again!
That’s great Chris! So glad you love this recipe.
Did you come up with the idea of using apple cider vinegar in this Thai satay sauce all on your own, Bee?
There are many ways to make Thai peanut sauce, you can use tamarind juice, like in this recipe: https://rasamalaysia.com/thai-chicken-sate-with-peanut-sauce/2/, regular Chinese clear “white” vinegar, or apple cider vinegar, or even lemon juice if all are not assessible. I am trying to make this recipe really easy for my American readers, with easy-to-get store bought ingredients, so I use apple cider vinegar. Instead of salt, you can use fish sauce for better umami flavor, and instead of sugar, you can use Thai palm sugar. It’s all about simplifying the recipe so everyone can make it. :)
this may be a dumb question but can curry powder be substituted? I am kind of new to using curry.
You can try but I think it will not be as good. The curry paste is a “wet” paste.
I’ve been looking for a good peanut sauce recipe, I will definitely have to try this! Thanks for posting! Can I use regular vinegar in place of apple cider vinegar? Thanks!
Yes, please use according to taste, you can also use tamarind juice. :)
Love your site and recipes. This new Peanut Sauce recipe looks so much easier to make than the one included in the Beef Satay Recipe. Is there one ingredient I can or should add to make it Spicy Peanut Sauce for Beef Satay? Thank you!
Yes, there are so many different kinds of satay peanut sauce and this is the easy ones that is very accessible. To make it spicy, you can use more red curry paste to taste.
I love peanut sauce so much I think I may even try it on ice cream one day! thanks for this simple recipe. Is this a typo or what do you mean by jam? ‘peanut butter jam’
Ice cream, that’s a great idea. Yes it was a typo. Fixed.
Thank you for the nice recipes. Have a Happy Tuesday.
Bee…congrats on the new sponsorship. Recipe looks yummy as usual, and may 2014 bring more power to you. :)
Hi Lily, thanks for your kind words. Same to you and I am so thrilled to be working with Beka Cookware.
Does this saucepan scratch easily? Mine scratch badly because of the whisk I use I think.
I don’t think so…Beka Cookware is very durable and this is tri-ply and the outer layer stainless steel and inside is aluminum. Very strong built.
I bought myself a non metallic whisk because of that. The new whisk doesn’t scratch anything.
I love peanut sauce didn’t know its so easy to make.
Yep, it’s so easy to make and you can get the ingredients easily too.
Rasa hi, how can i write to you in private? I sent you an email but no answer. I am not sure i sent to the right email